


A Rose By Any Other Scent

by Methoxyethane



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alpha Lance (Voltron), Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Canon Compliant, Disabled Character, Fluff, Keith (Voltron) Angst, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance (Voltron)-centric, M/M, Oblivious Lance (Voltron), Omega Keith (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-07 18:18:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16858981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Methoxyethane/pseuds/Methoxyethane
Summary: When Lance was eight years old, he lost his sense of smell. When he was eighteen, he got it back.





	1. Scentless Apprentice

When Lance was eight years old, he leaned too far over a firework he and his brother were lighting off and got a faceful of mild explosive. The result was a permanently dulled sense of smell, his most important sense as an alpha rendered down lower than what even the average beta could pick up. 

At the time of course, he was still pre pubescent, and the only thing he noticed was that he couldn't tell which of his family members was which by smell alone anymore. It was only as he grew up he noticed how much he was missing, as everyone in class started presenting left and right and the only thing he could tell was different were their attitudes. 

Lance wasn’t just scent blind to individual smells. He couldn’t even pick up the difference between an alpha and omega walking down the street, their entire society built on signals and rules he was realizing he was completely oblivious to. An alpha scent-marking his territory? An omega afraid and cowing? Not things he could smell. All Lance had to go off of was body language and voice, and those did not a complete story tell.

But Lance was confident his ability to read people by watching what he couldn’t smell would be to his benefit in life. Let’s face it, all of TV and music were designed to be consumed by people like him, since no one could beam scents via satellites yet. Yeah, not being able to smell like eveyone else sucked and would totally affect his social life, but all he had to do was work a little harder to get around that.

That’s why the Garrison was actually a perfect fit for Lance. Pilots needed perfect vision, but a sense of smell didn’t matter at all. In fact in space, if he went a step further and became an astronaut? It would be an advantage NOT to have a strong sense of smell while trapped in a small space with other mostly-beta space explorers. 

It was just frustrating that he, you know, kind of sucked at all of his classes. Which was of course, where Keith Kogane came in. 

Keith was cool, and confident, and good at everything he tried and he didn’t even  _ care _ . Between his aggressively closed off body language and his rebellious attitude there was no mistaking he was an alpha even as thirteen year olds, and soon Keith represented everything in the world Lance  _ wasn’t _ . 

He might not have resented that so much if Keith wasn’t also so much of a dick he refused to get down off his high horse enough to make a single human connection. He had no friends, refused to acknowledge anyone as his equal, and worst of all, he didn’t even GIVE a shit about any of it. He was everything Lance worked so hard to be, and he didn’t even have to try to be better than him.

So, when he threw it all away and got himself kicked out of the Garrison because of a petty fight? Lance kind of took it personally. Going to space was his DREAM, and Keith just let an open scholarship guaranteed to get him there slip through his fingers because he couldn’t control his alpha hormones well enough to stop from attacking a teacher. 

Lance knew he was at a disadvantage when it came to controlling his instincts, new his body could pick up pheromones even when he couldn’t actually smell them. Knew that since he couldn’t walk into a room and instantly smell when the occupant was upset that meant he had to work twice as hard to watch their body and listen to their voice, and had to watch HIMSELF for those same tics because he couldn’t tell when a nearby omega was riling him up. Keith didn’t have to run around doing whatever he felt like, not if Lance could figure out how a little control.

So, needless to say, when he finally got his chance to go to space and it was only because Keith Freakin’ Kogane led him to his destiny, and was also a direct part of it? Yeah, he was not pleased, and didn’t bother pretending to be. Keith was just as much of a closed off asswad as ever, and Lance was no reason to play nice… Until it they were forced to.

Yeeeaaaahhhhh. It turned out teamwork was not only vital to a successful mission, but even bringing their Lions together to form Voltron in the first place. So. Fine, Lance could deal. Alphas made friends with other alphas all the time. Look at how close Keith was with Shiro, right? Lance could totally do that, he didn’t even have to deal with territorial scenting crap. 

Keith or not, space was still awesome, though. Alteans didn’t have secondary genders, so his disability had never come up as an issue even once in battle because none of space technology saw any use for transmitting scent, either. And it meant that Allura, the most amazing goddess Lance had ever laid eyes upon, would never never be able to be disappointed in Lance as an alpha because  _ she had no idea what an alpha was supposed to be in the first place _ . 

Basically, Lance’s life was going as amazingly good as he could hope it, barring Allura’s continued disinterest in his fabulousness. But he was a legendary space hero and he was GOOD at it, he was sure he was because no one had died yet and that was a total possibility so they must be killing it. Well, it had only been like two days so far, but it was a good start!

And um, then the castle was all under siege and Lance exploded a little bit in a spontaneous burst of heroism saving Coran. And also in a bomb. Mostly the bomb, is what exploded.

He didn’t remember much after that, mostly black with flashes of vague but incredibly painful memories. Seeing Sendak and thinking,  _ ‘I have a clear shot. _ ’ Keith’s face, expression warm and relieved as he gripped Lance’s hand, eyes shining honestly as he looked into Lance’s. And, though he would not be ready to admit it to himself for a long time, Lance remembers thinking that Keith wasn’t so bad to be lost in space with, after all. Especially considering how  _ beautiful _ he was… 

The thought that he wanted to get to know Keith better as a friend was the last thing he remembered before he went into the healing pod, and everything changed forever.

—

When the door to the healing pod opened and fresh air flooded into Lance’s lungs, he bolted awake, so startled he stumbled out onto the floor. What the flying blue lion was going on? What was that overwhelming indecipherable SMELL, and why was everyone too preoccupied by clocks to notice it?

Hunk caught him, and everyone was celebrating his safe return from the wrong side of of a concussion, asking him how much he remembered and - yeah, he had some blanks in his memory, maybe they’d explain the smell when they caught him up. Post galra explosive smoke stains or something. 

He got dressed and everyone herded him into the kitchen to get some nutrition into his system, telling the story of the Balmera and everything he missed while he as out. Also Keith referred to That One Time as a  _ bonding moment _ and Lance was SO not prepared to deal with whatever was going on with that right now, like. No. Let’s just shove whatever alpha-on-alpha manly bro platonic feels may exist right down to the bottom of his gut where he could rightly ignore them.

And anyway, none of that was nearly concerning as the fact that no one had bothered to tell him what the fuck that super powerful STENCH was, and it was starting to give him a migraine. It was too... nuanced, too ubiquitous, it was everywhere at once and a the same time seemed to be like a million tiny little different smells mashed together, and it all changed depending on what direction his head was tilted. And if his broken ass was this bothered, shouldn’t normal alphas like Shiro and Keith be passed out right now?

“Yeah, yeah, okay,” Lance said, brushing aside Hunk’s girl-centered monologue. “We can go back to the Balmera to go free your girlfriend any time, for right now is anyone gonna tell me what the hell kind of stink bomb went off in here? That smell is so strong it’s making my entire face hurt.”

Everyone exchanged glances that were, at best, confused. “Stink bomb?” Shiro frowned. “You know if you smell something that isn’t there, that could be a sign of a brain injury. Are you sure you’re feeling alright, Lance?”

Trying not to panic at the words ‘brain injury,’ Lance waved his hands. “N-no man, I’m fine! I feel great! I’m just a little…” He searched for an excuse. “Probably a side effect of the healing pod, I’m fantastic!”

“Healing pod…” Hunk looked Lance up and down. “Hey man, you don’t suppose that could have like… Fixed your Thing? Because none of us smell anything weird, and… Well I mean, maybe you’re just finally smelling…”

“...What you guys smell?” Lance finished for him, eyes wide and heart racing. No way. No way, that couldn’t be right, he’d been to like eighty different doctors as a kid! What he had COULDN’T be fixed, it was just… a permanent disability! “Disabilities don’t get HEALED! That’s not how it works, if it could be FIXED then I wouldn’t be disabled!”

“Disability?” Shiro’s look was deadly serious. “Lance, did you have a physical disability we need to know about? If it’s something that could come up while fighting the Galra…”

“It isn’t though, it’s nothing! I just have a really bad sense of smell, I got a bottle rocket up my nose as a kid, it’s nothing that’s even a thing.” He paused, still dizzy from the onslaught of smells as well as now kind of freaking out. “Or wasn’t even a thing, I guess.”

“Wait,” Pidge leaned in, examining Lance’s face. “Wait you’re telling us you’ve had a damaged sense of smell his whole time? Is THAT why you’ve been so oblivious to like… everything?!”

“Hey, I’m doing my best!” Lance slammed a hand on the table. “I’m like, a master observationalist, these perfect eyes see ALL, baby!”

“You… can’t smell?” Keith’s voice was quiet, head tilted curiously to the side. “So… you couldn't even smell an omega in heat if they were standing right next to you?”

“Well I don’t understand what the big deal is all about,” Allura sighed. “It’s just smell, and he has it all back now, doesn't he? I don’t see what impact not being able to SMELL would have on his skills as a paladin.”

“THANK YOU, Allura! No, it doesn’t! Not being able to smell my teammates hasn’t gotten us killed yet and I don’t see how it could start now, so. It’s all fine!”

“Except that you got it back,” Hunk pointed out. “At least, it seems like you did. Can you describe the uh, ‘smell’ that’s bugging you? Is it, is it like just one solid smell? I mean I’m a beta, so I wouldn’t know what you’re SUPPOSED to smell, but...”

Lance sighed, breathing a huff out through his mouth because he wa still trying to avoid breathing with his nose right now. Stood up and leaned in to sniff Hunk’s neck, pulling back with a gasp of “HOLY SHIT TOO CLOSE, TOO MUCH!”

Shiro’s forehead landed in his hands. “Lance, try not to overdose on your friends and pass out. I know you don’t know what it means to be an alpha yet, but sticking your face into people’s necks is generally ill advised.”

“I’m an alpha!” Lance defended weakly, collapsing into the table to hide his face in his coat. “I’m a good alpha, I swear!”

“I think,” Coran patted Lance on the back, and ohhh that was nice Coran barely smelled like anything compared to the others. “It might be time for you lot to explain exactly what an ‘alpha’ is, then? I’m afraid the princess and I are ah. A bit lost.”

What followed was an explanation of what everyone on Earth already knew about secondary genders while Lance plugged up his nose and buried his face into his own clothing to try and block out the deluge of information he couldn’t comprehend. 

God what was happening, and why did he just feel bitter about it instead of grateful? He’d regained a lost sense, this should be awesome, not… overwhelming and kind of depressing. Maybe there was a way to go back. Maybe he could explode his face again and prove to everyone he could be a real alpha even without being able to smell.

“...And this is where Lance’s lost sense of smell comes in. Since alphas have the highest range of ability in his area, they’re the ones in charge of maintaining pack order, because they’re most attuned to the people around them by being able to smell changes in their body chemistry. Even subtle shifts like mood can be picked up, so alphas can walk into a room and be able to tell just from smelling the occupants, what gender and caste they belong to and a baseline mood of everyone there. Omegas have similar receptor functions, but since they’re built for childcare their sense of smell is always more attuned to their own pack and less useful in large social functions.”

Pidge rambled off scientific facts, not important enough to raise his head for. A hand came down to tentatively pat his shoulder, and when Lance lifted up enough to peek at who he was surprised to see an awkward looking Keith trying to give him a comforting half-smile. Huh. That’s not who he’d expected. Kinda nice.

Or maybe not, because the second his face lifted out of his arms a huge wall of scent slammed him in the face, so forcefully thick Lance squeezed his eyes shut to stop the sting of tears as he coughed out, “Jesus, is that all just  _ you _ ? I think I’m gonna puke.”

Keith’s hand retracted like he’d been burned, backing away from Lance with a hurried apology. 

“No, dude, I didn’t mean…” Lance’s mumbled apology was cut off, Pidge’s monologue having been interrupted by Allura.

“Ah, so a sense of smell is vital to human social situations. Lacking one must mean Lance has been unable to maintain pack order until now, yes?”

“OKAY,” Lance jerked up, hands slamming on the table to shove himself out of his chair. “I think we’re done here, I’m all caught up on what I missed in the explosion, thanks guys. Let’s never talk about any of this again, okay, that sounds fun!”

Shiro stopped him with a gentle hand on his shoulder, voice reassuring when he spoke. “Sorry Lance, this has to be overwhelming. Why don’t you get some rest, and we can see about helping you… adjust later on.” A small sigh. “I don’t suppose anyone else is hiding any disabilities that might get suddenly healed by super advanced magitechnology?”

“Um,” Pidge tugged nervously on a lock of blond hair. “Well I wasn’t gonna mention it since everyone was gonna notice when my scent blockers ran out, but my medical records have some slight lies regarding… Both of my genders. I’m not a beta male, I’m an omega… and a girl. So. Um, hi, guys.”

No one else particularly reacted, aside from Coran wondering that they were supposed to think she was anything else.

Lance blinked at… her? “You’re a  _ what _ now?”

“Yeah,” Pidge apologized. “I did figure it was just you who wouldn’t notice.”

—

He could only spend so much time hiding in the sterile cockpit of Blue Lion, and eventually things settled down and Lance learned to distinguish individual scents instead of living in a giant miasma of chaos. Which was good, since Lance was a fan of being able to breathe without gagging on the air around his friends.

He’d never lost his entire sense of smell, so he still remembered had a sense of taste and memories to go with it. He was thankful of that now, because he’d have gone nuts with all these new smells around if he’d had no way to describe them and no past experiences to compare them to. 

Having that background, once things settled down instead of terrifying it was actually like, super fascinating and awesome. Lanc basically went off like a bloodhound, investigating every possible scent in the entire castle with obsessive interest.

Altean technology smelled different from anything on Earth, the only scent Lance could liken it to was one he remembered from playgrounds in school: asphalt after a fresh rain. Something subtle and clean and almost electric, but not  _ quite _ . The entire castle carried hints of this scent, but it was especially strong around any crystals, and when they went to the Balmera to liberate it from Galra control he found the massive symbiote smelled not just like asphalt and rain, but a thunderstorm over the ocean as well. 

But that was just the smell of the technology. The castle itself a very clean uniform scent, not one artificially manufactured but a natural smell that Lance assumes it must have carried all the way from the air of Altea herself.

He suspected that because the two Alteans also had that same fresh laundry scent, apart from the natural individual smells Lance soon noticed they also had. Mostly Coran smelled like the crap he used fo moustache wax and Allura smelled like juniberry shampoo, and also the ‘male’ and ‘female’ type scents Lance was picking up from species to species, but after enough time there were even tinier nuances Lance could smell that he couldn’t even explain.

They smelled like cotton compared to the others, whose outrageous human scents blocked out anything even after they’d left the room. And yes, Lance was including himself. His nose was so sensitive he could smell his own B.O. at all times, and had ended up with an even more obsessive hygiene routine than ever in an attempt to escape what was beginning to feel like second puberty. He just smelled so BAD all the TIME!

And then everyone insisted he smelled like a Bed Bath and Beyond outlet store and needed to calm the fuck down and just let himself stop noticing it the normal way by getting used to it, which, FINE, but that meant Lance was gonna obsess over how everyone  _ else _ smelled instead. Which was easy.

The most powerful scent belonged to Pidge by far, since she really WAS pubescent and her omega hormones were basically exploding all over the castle. A powerful vanilla mint, an explosion of candy that followed her like a cloud and grew more peppermint-strong like candy canes when she was deep in concentration.

By comparison, Hunk’s scent was so faint he might as well have been nonexistent. When Lance singled him out of the pack, easy enough to do just with his old habit of using his friend as furniture, Hunk smelled warm and comfortable and soft like fresh banana bread, and it quickly became the most comforting scent in the castle. Betas man, there was no better friend to have your back. 

Alpha’s scents typically repelled one another and riled each other up, but since Shiro was their pack leader Lance wasn’t surprised to find he didn’t find the captain’s scent uncomfortable. It was manly and piney and when he got real serious you could smell the insanity so strong it sent tingles down Lance’s spine. And when he was actually angry or in the heat of battle it sizzled up like crackling firewood, intimidating and commanding and WAY scarier than he just looked. Lance had had no idea what kind of power a real alpha had until he regained his sense of smell, tell you what.

And then there was  _ Keith _ . 

Keith was… complicated. It wasn’t that he smelled BAD, in fact when that bizarre citric scent wasn’t clogging up Lance’s nose and making his eyes water and sting so bad he thought they’d fall right out of his head it was kind of a nice, potpourri kind of thing, but. My GOD, that ginger-spice lemon-orange citrus HOTNESS to his scent was so powerful, Lance couldn’t stand even being around it. He guessed  _ this _ was what rival alphas had to put up with around each other… 

Even though Pidge’s scent was the strongest, Keith’s was always the one easiest for Lance to pick out, so intense it was. He could still smell it in a room after Keith had left, could follow his whole trail through the damned castle and the one time Lance found himself wandering the trail from Keith’s room to Red Lion’s bay he realized this was what scent tacking was, and holy shit he had just done it on ACCIDENT how cool was that?!

So okay, tracking was a thing Lance had always felt he was missing out on. There were a lot of thing he’d always heard about but never been able to truly understand until now, and when he realized he was slowly opening doors that had been closed to him all his life… well. He wanted to play, obviously. 

And by play, he meant literally. There may have, somewhere in between dodging Zarkon nipping at their tail, a forcefully arranged game of hide and seek so he could learn to track every one of his friends by scent, badgering Allura into it by arguing it counted as stealth training for all of them and the opposite of stealth training for him so everyone was learning how to navigate the battlefield better now go hide anywhere that isn’t a personal bedroom while I count to a hundred please.

Unsurprisingly, Keith was the easiest to find every time, the citrus scent so easy to follow Lance almost did it on accident. By contrast Allura herself was the hardest to track, only the sweetness of her perfume left after he picked through all the others overpowering human sweat glands. 

Lance found it nice. Allura’s scent, that is. Everyone else was still stifling and overwhelming to be around for too long, and as much as Lance was getting used to it, he found that hanging out with Allura was a wonderful reprieve. Ah, beautiful, badass, AND calming to be around, Allura really was the perfect woman, wasn’t she~?

She wasn’t even the only badass alien Lance got to enjoy his new sense around. Every alien species and every planet all smelled different, and everywhere they went was an endless buffet of new experiences. Lance had thought space was fun and interesting BEFORE, this was like finding out he’d been seeing it all in black and white this whole time!

Good smells he wanted to share with Allura and Pidge and rancid awful bad smells he wanted to trick Hunk into getting a whiff of, hungry food smells and dirty mechanical smells and everything was so much FUN! Once everything stopped being dizzying and overwhelming, Lance was having the time of his life playing with all the amazing gofts space and his new sense had to offer.

It was amazing. But… there was one thing still kind of bothering him.

Lance had always been trying to prove himself, show that he could still be just as good as an alpha even when he was disabled. Now that he was no different than anyone else… there was this strange hollow feeling he got sometimes, like he had betrayed every other person who was still scent blind like he had been. 

Lance didn’t really know what to do about THAT feeling, but. At least he didn’t feel directionless. He may not have to prove all the same things he needed to before, but every time he saw Keith he still remembered how much he wanted to prove that someone who worked hard could be just as successful and amazing and someone with natural talent leaking out of their ears.

Well. That wasn’t usually ever the FIRST thing he thought when he saw Keith anymore, but it uh, still showed up from time to time. Somewhere in there.

...Space was  _ full _ of pretty people.


	2. Come as You Are

Human beings were made of two genders, six sexes, and three genital presentations. Somehow, for all as messy as that should have made mating, every individual sex had an opposite partner they ‘matched.’

Alpha males paired with omega females, beta males went with beta females. And lastly, the two sexes that possessed binary genitalia belonged with each other. Everyone knew there was nothing more potentially fruitful than an alpha female and omega male together; the only two sexes who could both impregnate each other at the same time.

For all everyone pretended it made sense, there was still a lot of sexual confusion everywhere that went largely ignored and unspoken. There were so many potential mating variations it wasn’t possible to look down on all of them, especially when betas outnumbered alphas and omegas so drastically, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t discriminate. All you had to do was not quite fit in your assigned sex, not quite be like the other omegas, not fit exactly into the standard mold of behavior, and anyone had the right to call you whatever trash names they wanted.

For Keith Kogane, this was something he had endured his entire life.

He remembered his dad joking once that the reason he acted like an alpha was because he and his mother hadn’t known Keith was an omega for the first two months and had started out raising him as a an alpha girl until his scent had revealed him to be more unmistakably male by the day. It was nothing but a joke of course, those short few weeks being too far in the start of his life to leave any actual impact, but it was something that stuck with Keith anyway. Probably because he hadn’t had time to hear that many of his father’s jokes before he’d lost him forever.

Either way, Keith was weird. He was a weird omega, too aggressive and too ambitious, and his entire life had seemed to him to be one giant stubborn display of how he’d never fit in with anyone because no one had the patience for a little rabbit pretending to be a wolf.

Shiro had been the first person to actively encourage Keith to pursue his talents even against society’s wishes, and in some ways, he was still the only one who ever had. But he wasn’t the only person not to look down on Keith for his sex, wasn’t the only person who had never used it against him in an argument, wasn’t the only person to accept him as being talented and worthy of respect even as an omega. Shiro was the first family Keith had ever been able to put his faith in, but once he found Voltron he found an entire pack.

And that was where the enigma that was Lance McClain came into the picture.

Lance had been in the same classes as Keith in the Garrison, and Keith realized not long after why it was he hadn’t remembered the other boy. Not because he wasn’t interesting or loud - no, Keith had not remembered Lance because Keith only remembered the alphas in his class that had spat the word ‘ _omega_ ’ in his face like venom as they shoved past him in the hallways. And Lance, while unmistakably just as bitter about Keith’s talent as everyone else, had never once brought up his sex in any of the rude things he’d ever shouted at Keith, not even in implication.

Keith didn’t even have time to over analyze it before he found out why. Only days after arriving in space Lance had been critically injured, and his release from the healing pod had come with the revelation that he’d been scent-blind the entire time.

Everyone in the entire school knew Keith was an omega, so it couldn’t be any stupid reason like Lance not even knowing he should be making fun of him. No, the only logical explanation was that his disability had left him with a different social awareness than other alphas; that not being able to smell Keith meant that his very presence couldn’t be an irritant like it was to the other alphas in school. He couldn’t smell the wailing siren of Keith’s pheromones, and had no reason to thusly hate him for its obviousness. It was _fascinating_.

It also left Keith with absolutely no idea how to feel about his teammate as a person. Lance may not have been a SEXIST jerk, but he was still the kind of jerk to try and make everything into a competition just to piss off Keith, so. That kind of left them in an interpersonal limbo. Keith could find a lot of reasons to respect Lance, could even find reasons to like the other boy. But as long as Lance kept blaming random bad luck on Keith’s presence and avoiding his company because Keith’s very presence gave him a headache… yeah. It was hard to make friends like that.

Time improved that, though. Also Voltron helped the most, the constant training and missions and necessary teamwork proving to be the balm that made their relationship go smoother. Lance got used to his new sense of smell enough to be able to be able to endure standing next to Keith without his eyes watering, they ended up working together nearly constantly, and both of them discovered and accepted they actually made a really good team when they stopped bickering enough to listen to each other’s ideas. Keith was even starting to think they might be friends, noticing that Lance’s ribbing had grown less malicious and more playful in nature even as they never really stopped arguing.

Keith was just starting to get comfortable in his new life in outer space, was just starting to think he might finally have found real acceptance in the pack he’d always longed for. And then they’d met Ulaz of the Blade of Marmora, and everything changed forever.

Knowing you aren’t normal isn’t the same as suspecting you might actually be an alien from outer space. And finding out he was Galra, the very race that was subjugating the entire universe and had personally assaulted himself and his entire pack… That was a little bit much to take in.

At least it explained why he was such a lousy omega, he guessed. Dad had always told Keith he took after his mother, after all.

He wanted to think that the others didn’t think any different of him for his genetic heritage, but… Actions spoke louder than words, and Allura had iced over like a glacier. Everyone else was awkward, even Shiro, and Keith was beginning to wonder if this was really the place he fit in after all. He’d always had such a hard time connecting with people, and sometimes he thought everyone would be so much more comfortable if he was just gone. And now, maybe even safer without him...

“What’s up loserface, what’s got you sulkin’ like a dateless emo?”

On the other hand? At least there was Lance. Maybe it was because he was an alien-fucking pervert, but he somehow managed to be the only person not to react at all to Keith’s outed secret identity. Even Pidge kept side-eyeing him like she was dissecting him with her eyes, but Lance’s literal first words at the public revelation had been, “Are you telling us this because it _matters_?”

Keith snorted something that might have been a laugh out through his nose, uncurling his knees from his chest to sit on his ledge in a less obviously needy manner.  “Not everyone’s universe centers around their dick like yours does, Lance. I can be emo without caring that I’m dateless.”

Lance blinked, probably trying to suss out how much of that statement was a joke before his nose burst into a breathy half laugh of his own. He strolled the rest of the way across the lounge to where Keith sat, leaning against the wall in a casual slump.

“So, the Galra thing is really bugging you, huh?” Lance eventually said, after a few long moments of silence had settled over them.

Was it hilarious or pathetic that it was Lance of all people who was the first to ask Keith about his own feelings on this? Like, it was true Shiro was the only one he had ever been close to, but historically their blue paladin had been the one to give the least amount of shits about Keith as a person. For chrissake, Keith had just gotten back from an entire mission with Hunk, the most emotionally sensitive person on their entire team, and he had spent the entire trip asking piddly shit like secret fucking Galra handshakes.

God, this was all too much. Why did this have to happen while he was trapped on a spaceship and had nowhere to escape to to get some goddamned air?

He heaved out a sigh that was bigger than his lungs were, and put off breathing in again just to feel the sting in his chest. When he did finally bother to inhale again, he was surprised to find that the scent of Lance standing next to him was actually pretty comforting. Like being around Shiro was, except… you know. Different on every level? The only actual comparison was that they were both alphas Keith didn’t hate, so it was probably the feeling of like. Having a pack, or whatever.

It was still enough that Keith found his mouth opening before he had quite decided he was really going to answer yet. “More than just _bugged_ , Lance.” The words came out in a sharp huff, only managing not to be a hiss because it was too heavy. “I just found out I was never even a _human being_ , it’s not like my whole stupid life wasn’t turned upside down or anything.”

Lance took a moment to answer. “Well I can understand why you’d THINK that but… It doesn’t seem like anything is different to me. If you haven’t Galra’d out by being in space and fighting against them this long there’s no reason to think you’d randomly switch sides and become an enemy. I mean for one thing, you’re way too KEITH for that.”

“Too _‘Keith_?’” Was that a compliment or an insult?

“Yeah,” Lance shrugged cheerfully. “You’re all like, loyal and noble and crap, like a TV hero.” A pause. “No, like a TV ANTI-hero, ‘cause you’re all broody and had a motorcycle,” he decided with a firm nod that made Keith snort out another weird chuckle.

“You’re not the type of guy who’d betray us just because you suddenly have family you’ve never met or heard from on the other side of the war,” Lance picked up again. “Human or not, you’re still Keith.”

Still Keith… whatever that meant. “I’m,” he started in a voice that was too thin and vulnerable for his liking. “I’m not even the person I thought I was, though. How can I still be ‘Keith’ if I don’t even know who that is?”

Lance didn’t have an immediate answer this time, and Keith found himself speaking out loud of worries he hadn’t even been able to admit to in his head. “And even if I’m okay with being a Galra myself, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s… it’s a _label_ now. It’s a thing I am that everyone knows, and I’m supposed to be a paladin of Voltron, supposed to stand for the fight against Zarkon’s empire. How can anyone trust me to save them when I’m one of the enemies they’ve feared for ten thousand years?”

“Hey,” Lance said firmly, pushing off the wall in a jerk to make Keith face him eye to eye. “Hey come on, cut that out. You may be a dick but you’re not evil, and I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise myself. You’ve fought harder than any of us in this war, you CARE more than anyone but Allura herself, just having some stupid Galra genes won’t change that. I mean seriously, do any of us hold Pidge being white against her? ‘Cause that’s like the exact same thing!”

Keith’s jaw opened, ready to argue back against pretty much anything Lance had just said, but instead all that came out was a startled laugh of “ _What_ ?” Keith shook his head. “Did you just compare Galra to _white people?_ ”

“You know I’m right!” Lance defended. “If none of us blame Pidge for **her** colonist genocidal ancestors no one can say shit about yours either, dude!”

The sheer absurdity of the argument was too much to fight against. “You got me,” Keith admitted with a baffled shake of his head, something like a tiny smile tugging at one corner of his lips. “You got me, no one is mad at Pidge for being caucasian.”

“Exactly!”

“...Except Allura DOES hate me for being Galra now. If you hadn’t noticed.”

Lance winced. “That’s… I’m like 90% sure that’s temporary. She’s not a racist, she’s just traumatized. Give her some time to get used to it.”

Keith closed his eyes, leaning back against the wall he was sitting on until his head thumped against it. “How about me, Lance? How much time until I get used to it?”

“Well. I’d say you’re probably traumatized right now too, so. As much as you need, I guess?”

Somehow, that wasn’t the answer Keith had expected. Was he traumatized? He didn’t feel like it. Shaken, definitely. He wasn’t happy about this situation, but… It was also something he’d suspected for a long time, so it wasn’t really a shock, deep down. What DID Keith feel right now?

Oh. That was it.

He was afraid.

Keith was afraid of himself, and the things he didn’t know yet. And he was afraid that no one would ever accept him again. That he’d come so close to having a place to belong only to be cast aside once more.

Except that apparently Lance had accepted him without question. Odd, since he didn’t even LIKE Keith.

But he was still the only person who had accepted him entirely, and right now it was hard not to wonder if Lance would remain the only one. He knew it was stupid to dwell on when they had a war they had to fight, that whether or not people hated him didn’t suddenly exclude him from his responsibility to Voltron but…

He didn’t know. It had just been nice to feel like he was part of something, that people really cared about _him_ for once in his life. It just sucked he had to go back to living on his own. While surrounded by people who didn’t fully trust him. Again.

Keith was shocked out of his thoughts when Lance swept forward, gathering Keith into his arms for a tight hug. A hug was, theoretically, a normal way packmates comforted each other when they smelled one another’s distress, but… Even if they had really been that close the way Lance was doing it wasn’t quite right.

They weren’t family, which meant the proper way to hug would have been to clasp hands first, to have their joined arms between their bodies for the embrace. It was the comfort of physical contact with just enough space between two bodies to prevent the scent glands on their necks from rubbing against each other, but Lance had just skipped right over that step and Keith was suddenly waylaid by an onslaught of alpha surrounding his entire body.

It was dizzying. Keith could count the number of times he’d been hugged this decade on one hand, and the sudden flood of warmth and skin and smell and _Lance_ was enough that if he’d been standing up he’d have collapsed under his own knees. Lance didn’t let go, just kept holding Keith until the surprise passed and he melted into the embrace, and then kept holding him still.

He smelled like coffee, Keith decided. Not exactly like it, but rich and fresh and sort of french vanilla-y like good coffee smelled, and Keith had never let himself admit to how much he had always wanted to bask in it until just now when he was practically drowning in it. And now here he was, and it was so calming but also made his heart pound at the same time, Lance’s arms and smell and the breath on Keith’s neck all made him feel small and vulnerable and somehow _safe_ all at the same time.

He’d never been so intensely aware of being an omega before now when he was in an alpha’s arms, and the scariest part of all was how much he didn’t want it to end.

“Sorry,” Lance eventually apologized with a sheepish smile when he drew back, giving Keith one last half-awkward pat on the shoulders as the hug ended. “That was sort of… you just smelled. Like you needed it? Instinct I guess,” he laughed off, finally reminding Keith that he’d been without a sense of smell so long Lance probably hadn’t learned how to ignore distress pheromones like polite society dictated one does. Right… that explained the hug. Nothing weird after all.

Keith shook his head, shakily pushing himself up to his feet and offering Lance a weak smile. “You’re probably right,” he admitted. “Thanks, Lance. For actually listening.”

Lance smiled back, crooked and sincere. And Keith decided if he had one person still on his side, he could keep fighting.

Being Galra wasn’t enough to stop him.

\--

 


End file.
